China more

Wow what a day. I got up at 5:45am today. Incredible. So the purpose of this insane behavior was to go visit the Great Wall of China. We went to a section less than 2 hours from Beijing which is pretty close. However it isn't the really tourist bit so it wasn't crowded which was nice. This was my third time at the wall. And it is still awesome. It just seems to go on forever. Took like a million photos. Got totally ripped off coming back down though in the souvenir stalls. Shop people quote ridiculously high prices for stuff so you bargain way down. But even the bargained down price which you think is great is still a rip off as I found out later... Steve managed to buy a hat for 1/5 of the price that I got for the same one. And I thought I'd done well. Got some cool stuff though.

After the wall visited Tiananmen Square. Had wanted to go see pickled Mao but apparently the building is shut for a few months for renovations. Stupid Olympics. Beijing has gone crazy trying to tidy itself up. A whole huge road has been blocked off cause they're developing the whole street. And that was a very main part of the city.

So we hung about the square for a bit. Went into the Forbidden city etc. Then we went and got lost. Then we got taxi back to hostel and spend the night eating a lot of food. While watching Hot Fuzz. These youth hostels are great.

Think we might go wonder about the Sumer palace tomorrow which will be fun. Then we fly out!

China - Day ... who knows anymore

So the whole idea of writing a little about me daily travels is clearly not working. Must go back to recording my daily activities on paper.

So what am I doing right now. Well I'm sitting in a bar in a youth hostel in Beijing. Beijing is cool. Been here before though. We had Peking Duck and a fruit pizza for dinner. Mmm interesting. There are a lot of foreigners in this place which is a little weird cause its all been Chinese people where we've been. Going to see the Great Wall tomorrow. Leaving 7am!! We already seen it last week but it was in a different place and was basically just a mound of mud. Steve of course brought a considerable chunk of this mud back with him which just seems wrong! So tomorrow will be good. Drove past Tianamine square tonight in the taxi which was very exciting.

So how is China going on a whole. I'll give it a 8/8 if you know what I mean. Can't get much better than that!

China - Day 1 (again)

Hello all. Here is a summary of my week. I just know I will forget all this stuff if it isn't written down. So here it goes.

Day 1 - Tuesday
So last time I blogged was last tuesday morning. Right after that we went on our first trip into mainland China. Went just across the border to Shenzhen. Was all rather exciting. Didn't really do a lot once there. Just came back again. But everything went good!

Had some really weird food on the way back from McDonalds of all places. I thought it was an ice cream with kiwi sauce or something similar and chocolate bits. Turned out the sauce was green tea flavour and the chocolate bits were red beans. Yes I had beans with my ice cream. And you know it didn't taste too bad.

That night me and steve decided to wonder the streets of Hong Kong for something to eat. We went to the first non dodgy place we could find which turned out to be HK Hard Rock Cafe. Which played truely awful music.

Rubbish. I just tried running spell checker there and at least half of what I've wrote vanished. I thought they were meant to be incrediably technologically advanced here... Now where was I.

Ok so after food we wondered about the Avenue of Stars. This is like a promanade the overlooks Hong Kong island. Seen this at least twice before and it is still awesome. Then there are hand prints of famous China actors on the ground. I knew of two of them. Oh and there were these performers there. This wee China man was spinning this huge pot on his head and throwing it all over the place. Was a bit crazy.

Drat I've ran out of time. Didn't get very far there at all. Stupid spell checker. And I have so much to say. Ah I'll try not to forget...

China - Day 1

Me and Stephen are in Hong Kong! Finally. We arrived yesterday evening. Flight was pretty normal except BA managed to lose Steve's bag somewhere in London so that was fun. Well fun for me... Delivery man arrived at our apartment door at like 12:30 last night with the bag so all is ok again. Oh also we had to sit at opposite sides of the plane which was odd. But we were able to wave to each other so the separation wasn't too hard on us.

So what is Hong Kong like these days? Pretty dull. Sky is grey and it was raining a little earlier. Also quite hot and humid. So going out isn't much fun right now. Hence why we are sitting in a nice air conditioned library surfing the web. Had hoped to upload some photos here but apparently I'm not allowed... Oh and Hong Kong smells of that smell you get when you go into a Chinese take away. I like it!

Leaving to head into mainland China within the next couple of hours. Just me and Steve going on this trip so that will be fun. Its all rather exciting!

Nothing else to really write about. We haven't really done much yet besides eat some rather interesting food and sleep. But thats about to change!

Cows and Relient K

I met some cows today. This excited me a lot because cows always seem to run away from me. These ones were incredibly friendly. I took some photos.


Anyway Relient K have released a music video for 'The Best Thing'. Its just ok. Great song though. Its funny that many of Relient K's music videos seem to feature a single girl doing something random. And she is always brunette, mid twenties and very pretty! She is also in the video for 'Who I Am Hates Who I've Been' and 'Must Have Done Something Right' and possibly more I haven't seen/can't remember. Go Matt...